UK tipped for bumper eChristmas

European online sales this Christmas are set to beat all records, according to Santa's little helpers at Forrester.

They predict European online retail sales will total €7.6bn this year - up 86 per cent on last year.

And they claim the UK will be the brightest star of this year's ecommerce Christmas tree by spending a festive £2.6bn in November and December.

Although Germany has more eshoppers (18m) than the UK (15m), it spends 30 per cent less online than the UK. Instead, it seems Net shoppers in Germany prefer to research their purchases online before buying them at a shop.

That's why Germany's ecommerce turnover for this Yuletide is not expected to exceed €2.2bn.

Last month Gartner predicted that Europe would become the leading region for online sales in the run-up to Christmas with online sales set to top $15.77bn - up 75 per cent on last year.

North America should perform almost as well, it said, notching up around $15.66bn in online sales in Q4.

Together, Europe and North America will account for more than 80 per cent of all online sales in Q4, said Gartner. ®